


can't make myself heard, no matter how hard i scream

by butiwaswildonce



Series: Are you getting away with who you’re trying to be [3]
Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Character Study, Codependency, F/M, Grief, Relapse, Self-Harm, Substance Abuse, Therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:40:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22507216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/butiwaswildonce/pseuds/butiwaswildonce
Summary: Betty learns how to care for herself.Again, and again.~A snapshot of Betty's ongoing recovery journey.
Relationships: Betty Cooper/Jughead Jones
Series: Are you getting away with who you’re trying to be [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1515062
Comments: 8
Kudos: 59





	can't make myself heard, no matter how hard i scream

The Skype music fills the silence of Betty’s room, and she sits nervously on the edge of her bed, laptop on her knees, waiting.

Finally, a pixelated face appears, before becoming a clear image. Betty sighs, her shoulders relaxing minutely.

“Hello, Betty.”

Her therapist greets her as she has always done — avoiding the generic pleasantries, with a particular aversion to saying ‘ _how are you?_ ’ 

“Hey,” Betty replies. There’s an awkward silence, like there always is, but Betty sits comfortably in it, collecting her thoughts.

“So, what’s been going on for you lately, Betty?”

Christine was a portly older woman, in her fifties, with an extremely attuned bullshit-meter and an ability to ask Betty questions that nobody had ever thought to ask before. 

Betty launches, first, into a recount of her business, the scenery of the town, her colleagues, and even, at one point, Veronica and Archie. 

There were two glaringly obvious subjects Betty was leaving undiscussed. First, Jughead, but the one more immediately obvious for Christine, was Polly.

She hadn’t spoken to Christine since her first few months in Riverdale, having known the option to contact was always there but feeling more and more confident in her own coping and managing skills. Two days ago, however, she’d e-mailed with a request for a conference session. 

Two days ago, Polly had announced she was moving to L.A.

Two days ago, Betty had self-harmed for the first time in almost two years. 

She sat in her pyjamas at four o’clock in the afternoon on a Monday, healing cuts on her hands, deep purple circles under her eyes, staring unblinkingly at her therapist and telling her everything in Riverdale was _wonderful, really_.

As she talks, she feels her heart rate increasing, knowing the time that she has to lie and smile and fake it is drawing to a close. 

She talks faster, as though to avoid the inevitable, launching into a detailed story about how an employee had almost ruined their entire stock of scones for the day.

Hands waving exaggeratedly in front of her, frenzied in her avoidance, she knows the exact moment Christine sees the bandages on her hands, and flinches powerfully, subconsciously curling her fists inward, folding them under her legs, hiding.

“Take a breath, Betty.”

The air stutters through her, and it’s like a dam breaking. She feels her lower lip stiffen then shake, a painful lump in her throat, and she tries to talk, but all that comes out is a painful sob, her whole body shaking with it.

See, Polly had been her touchstone, since going into recovery. Polly, Beth, Kyle. They were who she woke up to every day, who she knew would _notice_ when something was wrong, who she had _wanted_ to be better for. 

As much as she knew there were others now, others in her life, and that it was the truth that she fought for her recovery for _herself_ , first and foremost. As much as all that was true… something inside her felt this cold sting of abandonment, and it threw her, regressed her.

She spoke as she cried, incoherent for the most part. 

How Polly had been gone more often than not, and how her nights where she was alone drove her crazy. 

How she had begun drinking to sleep again. And drinking to get through social occasions that she'd rather avoid. And drinking to distance herself from the immense guilt she felt, about drinking so much. 

She was supposed to be _better_.

Christine runs through their usual grounding exercises, calming her enough to actually breathe, and eventually, Betty wipes at her eyes, her chest beginning to rise and fall at a more comfortable pace. 

“It feels like there’s something here for you, an old wound, in that feeling of abandonment. Why do you think you feel that way?”

Something tugs at Betty’s memory, and she folds her arms together, hugging herself, holding herself together. 

She contemplates, starting to speak before forming her thoughts. “I…” she stops, considering.

She remembers when Polly had left for college. How it had been, living in the Cooper household as the sole child remaining. The way it had felt almost cruel, for that attention of her parents, so unbearable already when divided between their daughters, to be turned suddenly on her in its entirety. The sheer weight of their recognition, how it had burned and broken her.

“I guess I’ve always seen Polly as a co-conspirator. We… we don’t always see eye to eye. In fact, we disagree more than anything. But I thought… since our parents… since then.” She looks down, focusing on picking at a hangnail, rolling her bottom lip between her teeth. “I thought we were going to stick together, you know.”

And she knows they’re adults, that it sounds childish and trite, and she voices this, this discomfort with how she’s feeling.

“Betty, that sounds like the critical parent voice. What would it be like to rephrase how you’re feeling, and think about yourself as someone who has suffered a profound loss, very recently. And now, you are faced with what feels like another significant loss.” Christine pushes her glasses up her nose, letting her words sink in, before adding, “What would it be like to look at that woman who has suffered these losses, and offer her compassion, rather than judgment?”

And right there lies the crux, the thorn in her side. What _would_ it be like, to notice and understand her feelings without judgment, with compassion for the context in which they arise?

“I’m... not sure I know how.”

The truth in her words hit her more clearly after she says them, and she swallows the lump in her throat. 

Christine's voice is gentle. It brings her to the moment, and she tries to focus on the words being said to her. She flattens her palms on her comforter, making a conscious effort to avert the desire to re-open her wounds.

“That’s okay, Betty. It takes work. You are capable of getting there. For now, I wonder what it would be like if you practiced. For now, practice noticing the critical parent voice. If you can, try to find an alternative. Imagine you are an objective observer, hearing a parent saying those things to an upset child, or teenager. Try to find an alternative point of view.”

Slowly, Betty considers it. She knows she has been told this before, that this is not new, but that maybe she needed the reminder. Slowly, she nods.

“Okay.”

Christine reminds her of the safety plan they had written, together, what felt like forever ago. The alternatives to hurting herself Betty had come up with. 

She writes them down, in her journal, and keeps them by her bedside. 

After, when the Skype call is over, when her room is silent once more, she stares at her “contact” section of her safety plan. She eyes her cellphone, knowing there are multiple missed calls sitting there, ignored. She closes her eyes, swallowing the guilt, knowing within her that he will understand, that if anyone would, he will. 

Next to _“who to contact,”_ in her safety plan, she writes _Jughead_. 

Picking up her phone, she breathes out. 

She scrolls to his name in her messages, and hits call. 

~

**Author's Note:**

> title from portishead's biscuit.
> 
> please let me know your thoughts in the comments, and as always, thanks for reading!


End file.
